For The Love Of Port

I'm the guy who bought the port for the glasses...

Here is my query: What makes a glass good for port drinking?

or in the alternative, what makes a glass a poor port glass?

Well, a good glass would be a glass that will give you the optimal experience

Lot's of research (and I guess most of it should be classificed as pseudo-scientific) is and was done with regards to the optimal glass shape. The source is usually a glass manufacturers such as Riedel, LB, Schott & Wiesel, etc and no formal papers are usually published, just some marketing mumbo-jumbo.

They all tend to focus on the aroma dissipation in the glass and focussing aroma's to the point where one usually sticks their nose. Which is important of course, you want to be able to smell as many aroma's as possible. However, I have some doubts about the actual need for the many different glasses which they all have

But as well as aroma dissipation and focus there are other things that need to be considered to determine the optimal glass:

My personal list would be:

- surface area (influence on oxidation, but for sparkling wines also a huge influence on retaining the mousse (remember the old champagne coupes?)
- mouthfeel (I guess most people prefer thin glass)
- ability to swirl without spilling (this aerates the wine, which is important for vintage port (or LBV's)!)
- I personally have a tendency to think about wineglasses as "bigger is better" up to about .5l (1/2 quart).
- influence of heat-transfer from hand (usually unwanted, so use a stemmed glass)

For what it's worth - link here was an interesting write-up on the Malvedos blog on glasses that generated quite a bit of comment at the time either here or on another forum (though admittedly the tasting was hosted by Riedel and their Portuguese distributors (the Symingtons), so not a full range of what's available "on the market" was on show!)

Roel B wrote: - I personally have a tendency to think about wineglasses as "bigger is better" up to about .5l (1/2 quart).

I don't know how big Roel is thinking of, but i have recently found myself reaching for a larger white wine glass rather than my Riedel Vinum port or Schott Zweisel port-specific glasses, and for young LBVs / VPs i even prefer the huge Riedel bordeaux glasses these days rather than my Riedel/SZ port glasses.

But i think you just have to experiment and see what works for you - for the price of a good bottle of port you can get few different options and do a side-by-side test with a bottle to see which you prefer!

one further point: the level to which you fill the glass also seems (at least to me) to have an impact (and unfortunately - to my mind - the 50ml pours you get at a standard tasting of 14-to-a-bottle is probably often less than ideal...but then again when is 50ml of a good port ever enough?!)